Ich streifte bereits einmal den griechischen Schriftsteller des ersten und zweiten nachchristlichen Jahrhunderts Plutarch, der für seine Parallelbiographien bekannt wurde, in denen er jeweils die Taten eines großen Griechen denen eines großen Römers gegenüberstellte. Bei einem dieser großen Griechen handelt es sich dabei um Theseus...
... und mit diesem geht es gleich los. (Wieder muss ich auf Zeilenangaben verzichten, da Projekt Gutenberg.)
Es geht also um die Frage, ob dessen Begegnung mit den Amazonen auf derselben Reise geschah wie das Gürtel-Abenteuer des Herkules.Concerning his voyage into the Euxine Sea, Philochorus and some others
write that he made it with Hercules, offering him his service in the war
against the Amazons, and had Antiope given him for the reward of his
valor; but the greater number, of whom are Pherecydes, Hellanicus, and
Herodorus, write that he made this voyage many years after Hercules,
with a navy under his own command, and took the Amazon prisoner, the
more probable story, for we do not read that any other, of all those
that accompanied him in this action, took any Amazon prisoner.
Sein letzter Satz ist dabei ganz interessant und könnte als Beobachtung davon sein, dass die Erotisierung der Amazonen erst zu Zeiten einsetzte, in denen sich der klassische Mythenkanon schon verfestigt hatte. Sonst hätte man mehr Geschichten rund um gefangene oder gezähmte Amazonen und deren Nachkommen erwarten können, doch hier gibt es nur die "athenische Propagandafigur" Theseus und Thalestris als Sexualkontaktspartnerin Alexanders des Großen als "fast nur noch erotisch und kaum mehr etwas Kriegerisches".
Ich fahre nahtlos fort:
Hui, das ist ja eine komplett andere Amazonendarstellung: Gast- und männerfreundliche Amazonen. Das muss ich in den Mod aufnehmen.Bion
adds, that, to take her, he had to use deceit and fly away; for the
Amazons, he says, being naturally lovers of men, were so far from
avoiding Theseus when he touched upon their coasts, that they sent him
presents to his ship; but he, having invited Antiope, who brought them,
to come aboard, immediately set sail and carried her away.
Es geht weiter.
Dies ist also eine Stadtgründungsgeschichte, die die Errichtung einer athenischen kleinasischen Kolonie mit dem Wirken des athenischen Helden in dieser Region verbindet. Ich könnte sie in den Mod aufnehmen, auch wenn sie wirklich ein ganzes Stück weit wegführt.An author
named Menecrates, that wrote the History of Nicaea in Bithynia, adds,
that Theseus, having Antiope aboard his vessel, cruised for some time
about those coasts, and that there were in the same ship three young men
of Athens, that accompanied him in this voyage, all brothers, whose
names were Euneos, Thoas, and Soloon. The last of these fell
desperately in love with Antiope; and, escaping the notice of the rest,
revealed the secret only to one of his most intimate acquaintance, and
employed him to disclose his passion to Antiope, she rejected his
pretenses with a very positive denial, yet treated the matter with much
gentleness and discretion, and made no complaint to Theseus of any thing
that had happened; but Soloon, the thing being desperate, leaped into a
river near the seaside and drowned himself. As soon as Theseus was
acquainted with his death, and his unhappy love that was the cause of
it, he was extremely distressed, and, in the height of his grief, an
oracle which he had formerly received at Delphi came into his mind, for
he had been commanded by the priestess of Apollo Pythius, that, wherever
in a strange land he was most sorrowful and under the greatest
affliction, he should build a city there, and leave some of his
followers to be governors of the place. For this cause he there founded
a city, which he called, from the name of Apollo, Pythopolis, and, in
honor of the unfortunate youth, he named the river that runs by it
Soloon, and left the two surviving brothers entrusted with the care of
the government and laws, joining with them Hermus, one of the nobility
of Athens, from whom a place in the city is called the House of Hermus;
though by an error in the accent it has been taken for the House of
Hermes, or Mercury, and the honor that was designed to the hero
transferred to the god.
Er fährt mit der Amazoneninvasion fort:
Von diesen Monumenten wissen wir bereits.This was the origin and cause of the Amazonian invasion of Attica, which
would seem to have been no slight or womanish enterprise. For it is
impossible that they should have placed their camp in the very city, and
joined battle close by the Pnyx and the hill called Museum, unless,
having first conquered the country round about, they had thus with
impunity advanced to the city. That they made so long a journey by
land, and passed the Cimmerian Bosphorus when frozen, as Hellanicus
writes, is difficult to be believed. That they encamped all but in the
city is certain, and may be sufficiently confirmed by the names that the
places thereabout yet retain, and the graves and monuments of those that
fell in the battle.
Dass Antiope/Hippolyte einen Frieden verhandelt haben soll, ist neu.Both armies being in sight, there was a long pause
and doubt on each side which should give the first onset; at last
Theseus, having sacrificed to Fear, in obedience to the command of an
oracle he had received, gave them battle; and this happened in the month
of Boedromion, in which to this very day the Athenians celebrate the
Feast Boedromia. Clidemus, desirous to be very circumstantial,writes
that the left wing of the Amazons moved towards the place which is yet
called Amazonium and the right towards the Pnyx, near Chrysa, that
with this wing the Athenians, issuing from behind the Museum, engaged,
and that the graves of those that were slain are to be seen in the
street that leads to the gate called the Piraic, by the chapel of the
hero Chalcodon; and that here the Athenians were routed, and gave way
before the women, as far as to the temple of the Furies, but, fresh
supplies coming in from the Palladium, Ardettus, and the Lyceum, they
charged their right wing, and beat them back into their tents, in which
action a great number of the Amazons were slain. At length, after four
months, a peace was concluded between them by the mediation of Hippolyta
(for so this historian calls the Amazon whom Theseus married, and not
Antiope), though others write that she was slain with a dart by
Molpadia, while fighting by Theseus's side, and that the pillar which
stands by the temple of Olympian Earth was erected to her honor.
Verwundete Amazonen zogen sich also nach Chalkidia auf Euböa zurück, wo sie für den Namen eines Hügels sorgten. Das ist neu, glaube ich.Nor is
it to be wondered at, that in events of such antiquity, history should
be in disorder. For indeed we are also told that those of the Amazons
that were wounded were privately sent away by Antiope to Chalcis, where
many by her care recovered, but some that died were buried there in the
place that is to this time called Amazonium.
Es gibt also noch andere Amazonenspuren in Griechenland.That this war, however,
was ended by a treaty is evident, both from the name of the place
adjoining to the temple of Theseus, called, from the solemn oath there
taken, Horcomosium; and also from the ancient sacrifice which used to
be celebrated to the Amazons the day before the Feast of Theseus. The
Megarians also show a spot in their city where some Amazons were buried,
on the way from the market to a place called Rhus, where the building in
the shape of a lozenge stands. It is said, likewise, that others of
them were slain near Chaeronea, and buried near the little rivulet,
formerly called Thermodon, but now Haemon, of which an account is given
in the life of Demosthenes. It appears further that the passage of the
Amazons through Thessaly was not without opposition, for there are yet
shown many tombs of them near Scotussa and Cynoscephalae.
Hier spricht er also noch einmal die Episode des Hochzeitsanschlags an, hält sie aber für unglaubwürdig.This is as much as is worth telling concerning the Amazons. For the
account which the author of the poem called the Theseid gives of this
rising of the Amazons, how Antiope, to revenge herself upon Theseus for
refusing her and marrying Phaedra, came down upon the city with her
train of Amazons, whom Hercules slew, is manifestly nothing else but
fable and invention. It is true, indeed, that Theseus married Phaedra,
but that was after the death of Antiope, by whom he had a son called
Hippolytus, or, as Pindar writes, Demophon. The calamities which befell
Phaedra and this son, since none of the historians have contradicted the
tragic poets that have written of them, we must suppose happened as
represented uniformly by them.
Das war der Theseus-Teil. Hinsichtlich der Amazonen wühlt sich Plutarch auch nur durch das bekannte Material und präsentiert wenig Neues. Ich kann jedoch einige Verbindungen zu Griechenland für den Mod mitnehmen.